Shedding the wolf

I’ve had a slow sewing start to 2025, which is how I planned it since my own family already has so so so many quilts from me and I can’t really afford to have them professionally quilted just to give them away to strangers.  Even so, I have done less than I expected.  Less of everything, really.    However, inspired by my friends  Barbara and Marie Louise, I did finally find an organization that accepts the donation of unquilted quilt tops and I have donated three of those so far and plan to do more.  

(They requested Holiday fabric for some of them.)

I have been channeling my sewing energy more into bag making this year and so far it has not been very successful. Although the bags I’ve made so far all look good enough from across the room, up close they are very badly put together.   I am planning to try several more of them before I give up, hoping that practice will get me to a point where I am not ashamed of my creations.    The bags are functional and they will also be donated in the hope that someone can find some use for them.

I’ve finished making Christmas tree skirts and a handful of holiday throws to put away for each of my grandchildren for when they start their own homes, and to offer to Jack’s grown kids.   I also intend to include an embroidered table runner for each grandchild and think I might make Christmas stockings to add to those boxes.

It has been difficult to keep my mind on sewing, difficult to find peace.  This is a challenging time in our country for many people, and I feel the effect in my energy and mood.  Books that I used to consider dystopian now read like current events.  And yet the hummingbirds and orioles have returned, I saw a pretty little garter snake this afternoon, and life goes on.   I fear for my grandchildren, for all of our children, but there is some comfort in the thought that nature will survive us.

2024 has come to an end, and, largely because of the uncertainty created by the political climate, I am anxious about the year to come.  It is a good time to remind myself that in my own small world there is much to be thankful for.  I have a comfortable (if very messy) home, more than plenty to eat, wonderful grandchildren who are thriving, and a very patient and easy going husband.    It is too easy to dwell on the less pleasant aspects of life — the fact that I feel suddenly so much older and more vulnerable physically, the reality of my self-imposed social isolation (also largely political), the chaos of material possessions that need to be somehow organized so that I can work more comfortably — but year’s end is a good time to reflect on the strengths and goals that will help me move forward.  Because, as someone close to me reminds me often, now that we are going to have a felon in the White House, we know that ANYthing is possible and we might as well dream big.

2024 has not been without its accomplishments.  This year I read 137 books.  I finished 34 quilted projects, and hand-embroidered ornaments for each of my grandchildren along with 20 hand-embroidered blocks that will be assembled into a quilted throw.  I also made many pillowcases, a few bags, 3 Christmas tree skirts, and a variety of small projects.    Among the quilts was the “ghost” quilt that I gave the littlest grand, together with the book “The Little Ghost Who Was A Quilt” by Riel Nason.  (in the queue for next year is a second ghost quilt to put away with another copy of the book for potential great-grandchildren.)

In pottery class (so far) I  have created 3 mugs, 2 bowls, about 30 beads, a few little ornaments, and 4 or 5 little relish plates of various shapes and sizes.    I used an old, discolored lace doily that my mother made decades ago as texture on some of the plates.  Not all of my “creations” are glazed yet, so some of them will be next year’s finishes, but they were ready for the kiln before the end of this year.   Of the finished pieces, I put the beads on cords and gave them as necklaces.  Jack asked for, loves, and uses one of the mugs and a bowl.  None of it is perfect -- in fact, none of it is worth showing -- but it has been interesting and something different for me.  Next week the "teacher" who doesn't actually do much teaching has promised that she will show me how to use the wheel, and that will be a new adventure.

There was not a lot of travel, but Jack and I drove around our own state of Michigan for several days and stayed in several small towns to visit quilt shops we had never seen before.  He is getting much more involved in the process, as well as more involved in his own quite remarkable sewing journey, and is talking seriously about buying a small long-arm machine next year.   I am not encouraging him because I think there would be a long learning curve that I am not sure I am prepared for, not to mention the space such a machine would need, but he will (as always) walk his own path in this quest.  I had more plans but less energy this year than I had hoped, but it was not a total loss and I am grateful (and often surprised) to be doing as well as I am.   

And tonight is New Year's Eve.  I have never been to a big, festive New Year celebration and if I ever wished for such, I have definitely gotten over it.  When my kids were very small, I used to set the clock back so that at about 9 pm, past their bedtime, I could declare it a Happy New Year and send them off to sleep.  I suspect Jack and I will celebrate in much the same way.  But first of all we will share my favorite tradition with  my son and his family, the much anticipated chocolate fondue.  Much as I enjoy chocolate and have a fierce sweet tooth, I am most looking forward to time spent with them.  My family puts the "happy" in every year for me.

So good-bye to 2024 and a cautious welcome to 2025.  I wish all of us good health and fortune in the coming year, and hope that all sentient beings will find peace and plenty.  Happy New Year!

I did not think I would have a holiday card to send this year because I never got around to scheduling a family photo in time before my older grands went off to university.  But I snapped photos of the two groups while the kids were briefly home for Thanksgiving so my 3-?, 4-year? streak of sending Christmas cards is intact.   People have wondered who "belongs" to whom so I just did the two separate family groups this time.   We get so few cards in return that I know I am only doing it to amuse myself but I do enjoy the excuse to get us all together for photos.

I have been mildly ill too much again this month, with what I assume are mild viruses and vague symptoms that are more annoying than anything.  This week I have been dizzy, for no apparent reason, to the point that I am often holding the wall or grabbing at chairs.  Very unpleasant, enough so that I finally went in to see a physician, who told me it might be nothing, or then again it might be walking pneumonia, or an inner ear infection, or really who knows.  So he treated me for everything he could think of and told me to follow up if I'm not better in a week.    I have way too much to do less than 10 days before Christmas to be anything but better, so fingers crossed.    I suspect that my ill health is my own fault, with too little exercise, too much needless worry, and too much sugar.  At the far end of the family spectrum, my next oldest sibling turns 82 this week and he ran a marathon on his birthday and won a national title for his age group.  It is too bad that I am  not as easily inspired by him as I am by my older, lazier but maybe more introspective brother.   

I was sick for Jack and my 6th anniversary, but at least I did finally finish the hanging with the stars that served as our guest book for our two small family parties.   Finished is better than perfect!

My granddaughter is home from college and we've had one brunch together so far and, if I had not been too dizzy to plan, we would have had another by now.  Her brother comes home next week but he has sent me some wonderful clips of him practicing for his upcoming piano exam.   I will be so happy to see them both over Christmas, but I still have lots of shopping and wrapping and cleaning and sewing projects and planning to get done before then.  Hopefully we will all have a healthy finish to this year!

I was awakened at 3:30 a.m. today by a strange dream where I let my long-gone standard poodle outside at a long-gone house the kids and I used to live in.  She slipped through the gate and said, “happy birthday,” and I woke up surprised that she had remembered.  I also woke up to discover that it was true, I am 75 today.

I am old enough now to realize that birthdays really are a cause for celebration and that becoming 75 is something that is denied to many people.      I am especially lucky in the grand scheme of things, with a comfortable house, a loving husband, a sweet and healthy son, daughter in law and grandchildren, and even all three of my siblings still around to share the journey.  I am often distracted by routine aches, pains, political disappointments and challenges of the day, but let me never forget that I am fortunate indeed.

In my sewing ‘world,’ I sent 33 pieces out to be quilted this year.   I also made several bags, many pillow cases and aprons, several christmas tree skirts, and various odds and ends.  I have been trying to go on a ‘fabric fast’ and have restrained myself from going to the last few sales at our local quilt shops, trying to force myself to use up my stash.  Even when I do use fabric I have on hand, I most often need to buy more for backing and binding, so it is a slow process.    I keep sewing, and I definitely haven’t stopped quilting, but I am trying to be more mindful about it.   Here are only a few of my latest projects:

 Time has been flying by.   I can’t believe it has been so many months since I posted.  So much has happened, and yet so little.  My big grands are both in college and I am still and always endlessly proud of them.  They are smart and kind and level headed, genuinely good people.  Now that the political world seems to be changing in ways that make me anxious and confused, now that the political future of this country seems so uncertain, I find myself hoping and fearing for them in almost equal measures.  They are the bright lights in my world.

The little grand is changing from a baby to a child and is a frenetic delight.  He brings the wide-eyed sincerity that only a three-year-old possesses, sweet and uncomplicated.  He makes me think so much of my daughter at that age, when everything seemed possible, and makes me yearn for a do-over.  I was never an overly optimistic person, my life didn’t tend in that direction in the early years, but I’ve thought of myself as a realist, so my constantly wishing and reliving her childhood has been something of a surprise.   The funny thing about grief is that it causes constant pain and yet we are loath to give it up.

Nothing very much is new in our small lives, even though it seems like so very much is new in the world.  Jack and I took a quick trip to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania this summer, and it was more interesting than I expected.  I realized there, learning more about the history of the Civil War, that the seeds of what we are seeing now have been lying dormant, waiting for a chance to grow, all this time.   So the trip was more depressing than refreshing and, because Jack didn’t want to be away from home long, because it was a long way there and back, because all the sights there required driving, and because I am the driver, it was exhausting for me.  I will push harder for a “down” day between the long drives the next time we decide to travel.  We've talked about taking a trip for our anniversary, which is early next month, but we know the weather will be unpredictable so we will probably defer that until late spring if we do it at all.    

It is nearly time for me to feel justified in putting up a Christmas tree, which is something that I look forward to a lot more than Jack does!    I generally get up earlier in the morning than my husband does, and I love sipping my coffee by the light of the tree before the sun comes up.   There is something bittersweet, but soothing, about those little lights.

Jack and I are starting to toy with the idea of downsizing our home in the next two or three years.  I think that means I should probably finish unpacking and organizing from our move here five years ago.  It seems like everywhere I look I see a stack of things I don’t know what to do with.   In that spirit, I am making lists of all the things I should be sorting through, but so far I am  not doing any of it.  Maybe tomorrow!  (Maybe not.)